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Saturday Night Live (season 42)

The forty-second season of the NBC comedy series Saturday Night Live premiered on October 1, 2016 during the 2016–2017 television season, with host Margot Robbie and musical guest The Weeknd,[1] and concluded on May 20, 2017 with host Dwayne Johnson and musical guest Katy Perry.[2] The season has a reduction of ads by 30% by removing two commercial breaks per episode in order to increase programming time.[3] Episode 18 on April 15, 2017 was the first episode ever to be broadcast live in all four time zones within the contiguous United States. Until this episode, the show only aired live in the Eastern and Central time zones, and was tape-delayed in the Mountain and Pacific time zones.[4]

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Prior to the start of the season, Taran Killam, Jay Pharoah and Jon Rudnitsky were let go from the cast.[5][6] Killam, despite having signed a seven-year contract that would have taken him to the end of season 42, was dropped from the cast due in part to issues concerning his work directing the film Why We're Killing Gunther, which would have limited his time on the show.[7]

In August 2016, writing duo Chris Kelly and Sarah Schneider were promoted to co-head writers.[14] In addition, eight new writers were hired for the upcoming season: Kristen Bartlett, Zack Bornstein, Joanna Bradley, Anna Drezen, Julio Torres, Nick Kocher, Brian McElhaney, and Drew Michael.[15][16] After tweeting a controversial joke about Barron Trump, writer Katie Rich was suspended indefinitely.[17] In January 2017, writer Kent Sublette was elevated to head writer bringing the head writing team to four.[18]

This is the first SNL episode ever to be broadcast live in all four time zones within the contiguous United States. Previously, the show aired live only in the Eastern and Central time zones, and was tape-delayed in the Mountain and Pacific time zones.[4]

The forty-second season of SNL had a larger-than-usual ratings bump, partially due to sketches surrounding the 2016 presidential election and later the presidency of Donald Trump. According to Forbes writer Madeline Berg, the program "had its best season in 24 years, with an average of 11.3 million viewers in live-plus-seven-day ratings, which marks an increase of 26% from [the previous season]."[52] The Dave Chappelle/A Tribe Called Quest episode saw the highest ratings for the show since Donald Trump's hosting the previous season, and highest in the 18-49 rating demographic since December 2013.[26] The show received its best ratings for an October broadcast in eight years with the Tom Hanks/Lady Gaga episode,[23] while the Alec Baldwin/Ed Sheeran episode in February received the best overall ratings for the season thus far, posting its highest metered-market household rating in six years.[11]

Republican candidate Donald Trump — who hosted SNL the previous season and eventually secured the presidency in November — was unhappy with his portrayal on the show by recurring guest Alec Baldwin. On multiple occasions, both before and after winning the election, Trump used Twitter to publicize his thoughts on the impersonation, as well as the show: "Watched Saturday Night Live hit job on me. Time to retire the boring and unfunny show. Alec Baldwin portrayal stinks," he tweeted the morning after the Emily Blunt/Bruno Mars episode on October 16, 2016.[53] "It is a totally one-sided, biased show —nothing funny at all. Equal time for us?", he posted on November 20 after the Kristen Wiig/The xx episode, suggesting the show follow the equal-time rule, despite the presidential race being over.[54] His criticism continued preceding his inauguration: he dubbed it "unwatchable" on December 4,[55] and tweeted "Saturday Night Live is the worst of NBC. Not funny, cast is terrible, always a complete hit job. Really bad television!" after the Felicity Jones/Sturgill Simpson episode on January 15, 2017.[56]